Romance with a Bite

by Tamsin Baker

  Strange. I’d floated in and out of consciousness over the past however long, and each time he’d featured in what I’d believed to be visions. His hand in mine didn’t feel like a vision, it felt solid, real, reliable.

  My brain was a rambling, roiling tumult—a snow globe filled with words and ideas that had been shaken nonsensically.

  I tried to focus on how I felt about Gideon, how I felt about his lies. The anger wouldn’t come. All I felt was relief that he was here, for me.

  I’d never experienced that kind of dependability, not since Mom died. I relied on no one—me, myself and I formed my whole world. Things had worked just fine, until I glimpsed what it was to have someone in my corner.

  No longer did I have to go it alone. It felt good. Even if the feeling had been fleeting. Time with Gideon was filled with so much good, surely it wasn’t all lies?

  “Tiff.”

  His cool breath fanned my cheek and it felt amazing.

  I stirred and managed to crank open a second eye. Another breath shuddered through my lips. So dry.

  I tried to speak. No sound.

  Cool and wet brushed my lips. A cloth. Then it swept my brow. I recalled vague memories of the same sensation, many times over. Was that too Gideon?

  He stroked my brow. “You need to fight this, Tiff. I don’t want to lose you.”

  Of course he didn’t. Because that meant he’d lose his mortality.

  I hated that my mind went there, but much as I craved the life his bite and the visions promised, I had to hold what was real at the forefront of my mind. If I lost myself in a dream that turned to dust, how would I drag my way back from the disappointment?

  Something caught in my throat. I tried to breathe. Tried to cough past the boulder blocking oxygen to my body.

  He propped me up, rubbing my back, whispering words I couldn’t quite comprehend. The words I’d heard over and over through the interminable fog.

  “Moja láska.”

  Somehow they gave me comfort, when my thoughts would see me drown.

  The coughing subsided, leaving my body weak, my breathing a mere whisper of what it was. That same cool, wet cloth returned, moistening my lips, releasing drops of refreshing liquid that softened the sandpaper lining my throat.

  The cloth swept down my neck, down one arm, the next, momentarily stifling the burn. Ease seeped into my body. A sea, soft rolling waves lulling me into peace.

  The cloth stiffened. Stopped. “What the fuck are you doing here, Damon?” The frost in Gideon’s voice cut through my haze.

  “Much as you seem determined to believe it, I don’t hate you, Gideon.”

  “Give the man an Oscar, because you sure hide it well.”

  A sigh. Not Gideon’s. “I came to see if you need anything.”

  “Other than the antidote, no.”

  Another sigh. “I wish we could move past this crap.” A pause. “I hate that Annaline used you and betrayed us, that she carved up our friendship and spat it out like sour milk. And even more, I hate that she’s still here, still weaving her spells and shitting all over whatever we have left.”

  “This is nothing like what happened with Annaline.”

  “Maybe. But you’re making life-altering decisions over a girl you barely know.”

  “I’m not the green adolescent I was back then. I know enough.”

  The exchange washed over me, turbulent, unsettling.

  My eyes fluttered open just seconds before nausea hit. But I’d seen enough. A tall, grim-faced man stepped further into the room, black clothing, light hair, dark, angry eyes.

  “If I were to hand over the antidote, have you thought about what happens once the serum enters her blood? You can never bond. You can never be mortal. If her blood ever enters yours, it’ll be no different from the disaster we’ve just prevented. The antidote will spark The Change and we’ll be forced to hunt you down.” A sigh, the scrape of a hand through hair. “You may save her, Gideon, but by doing so, your one chance for mortality, or any remaining immortality, will be gone. How can I call myself a friend if I stand by and let you throw your entire existence away?”

  The silence following that little IED stretched for the longest time.

  I’d thought the pain in my body unbearable, the rasp of every breath interminable, but nothing matched the puncture of those words to my heart. At first I’d agreed to bond with Gideon to save him, and somehow save myself. But somewhere along the way, something had changed. I’d clutched onto the image of our shared future, and thoughts of it disappearing made my already ragged breath catch.

  “I love her, Damon.”

  All doubts left me with the crack in Gideon’s voice and those four wondrous words as they wrenched from his throat.

  Fuck.

  “Fuck.” The other voice—Gideon’s frenemy—his reaction mirroring mine.

  “I was afraid you’d say that.” Rustling. Then frenemy’s voice again. “Here. We destroyed the other vials, but I couldn’t destroy them all knowing I’d lose you altogether.”

  A sharp breath. A step. “What’s the catch?”

  “No catch. I just want my old friend back.” A pause. “Save her Gideon.”

  Silence. Then the swish of fabric. A hug? Backslapping.

  Cool hands freed my arm from the covers and ice-cold swabbed the inside of my elbow.

  The reality of what Gideon was about to do hit me square in the chest.

  No!

  I pulled away, trying to free my arm. “Stop.” The word hissed through my parched lips. I shook my head, setting off a spinning that refused to let up.

  “Tiff.” His cool palm brushed my brow. Cold until I could make it warm. “I have the antidote. You need to hold still.”

  “No.” I dragged in a shallow breath. “You won’t . . . be mortal.”

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  “Do it now.” He raised the syringe and I shrunk back. “Not . . . that. The mating.”

  Horror filled his expression. “No way. It’s too risky. You’re too weak. You need this Tiff. Trust me.”

  Funny thing was, I finally did. Too fucking late to matter.

  “My blood . . . poison . . . you.” Even as I said the words, bile scoured my burning throat. Coughing wracked my body. He raised me again, rubbing my back, caring for me in a way I’d never been cared for before.

  How could I lose him? Not when I’d only now discovered the truth.

  Love was more than manipulation. It was sacrifice.

  I tried to tell him. To let him know he should take me before it was too late. But the fog had thickened. The sandpaper in my throat swelled. I gulped, drowning, gasping for breath that totally evaded me. My mouth opened, but dark talons dragged me under.

  This wasn’t the end. It wasn’t the vision. We were meant for each other. Two marks make one, two hearts made whole.

  How could he not see?

  Life would be meaningless if I had to live it without him.

  Chapter 36

  Gideon

  “Damon!”

  My old friend moved in. He checked Tiff’s pulse, pulled back her lids to check her pupils. “She’s still alive.”

  Barely.

  I readied the syringe. “Hold her arm.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I glanced at him then. “What would you do?”

  He barely hesitated. His long lean fingers wrapped the tourniquet firmly around Tiff’s bicep and tugged it tight.

  “Wait.” He closed the door, wedging a chair beneath the handle, then grabbed a pair of gloves from the dispenser and dropped them onto the bed. “Put them on.”

  I didn’t argue. There wasn’t time. I slid them on, then tapped for a vein, feeling the weak throb of Tiff’s blood beneath my fingertip, the barely there flow drying the back of my throat. I inserted the needle then caught the vein, releasing the tourniquet, holding steady as I slowly injected the serum.

  The antidote was meant to be fast acting, but I had no idea what tha
t meant in terms of time and Tiff’s situation. Surely fate wouldn’t fuck me over this. I couldn’t be too late.

  I withdrew the needle, stemming the blood with cotton wool and tape, tossing my gloves and the empty syringe into the bright yellow bin.

  I nudged Damon aside, dropping into a chair, gripping Tiff’s hand, rubbing her knuckles. Maybe if I rubbed hard enough, I could rub the life back into her blood.

  An age passed, nothing changed. The rhythmic tick of a clock raced the turmoil of my thoughts. My thumb continued its play over her knuckles.

  Surely this wasn’t it.

  Her eyes shot open.

  My grip tightened.

  She gasped, her skin suddenly cooler, less clammy. Rosy, not feverish red.

  The fever had broken.

  Thank God.

  Another gasp. Mine. My hand dropped.

  Fuck!

  My chest constricted.

  Tiff inhaled, each breath sucking air from my lungs as if through a straw. I staggered up from my seat, a twisting, burning, splintering in my chest. Like a stake, piercing the place that should have housed my heart. A heart that would never beat, never live, never love.

  But Tiff was saved. Alive. That was all that mattered.

  “Gideon.” Damon. Shock filled his expression. “Fuck!”

  I lurched. He grabbed my arms, my legs crumpled. Droning sirens battered against my eardrums. My head spun.

  Tiff screamed. Another pierce to my chest. I tried to speak. No sound. No breath. No words.

  My eyes rolled back in my head, darkness drowning my world. Stealing my last breath before I was no more.

  Chapter 37

  Tiffany

  Noooo!

  Pain ripped through my chest.

  I pushed up in time to see Gideon crumple to the floor.

  “What have you done?” I looked from Frenemy to Gideon, then to the hole in my arm where the antidote had entered.

  I couldn’t save him now. Nobody could save him.

  But he should still have been alive. Immortal. Or had I robbed him of that too?

  No-no no-no no-no noooo.

  I slid off the bed, shaky, shivering, dropping to my knees. My fingers fluttered across his face, his chest, wrapping his hands in mine, bringing them to my lips.

  So very cold. The way he’d been in life.

  Would he warm now that he was no longer?

  Tears spilled from my face, wetting his cheeks, spotting the crumpled gray of his shirt. His eyes were open but empty. His chest still. Silent.

  “Gideon.”

  I rubbed his hands, holding them to my heart, as if the beat in mine could somehow inject a beat into his.

  Stupid. So stupid.

  I should have told him. I should have known. Through all my mistakes, this was the one I’d never forgive.

  I pressed my lips to his. A fairytale kiss. All I needed was a fairytale ending. The vision I’d wanted with all my heart that would never, could never, come true. Not now. Not ever.

  “Gideon.”

  I kissed his face, his chin. His beautiful, strong neck. Then I returned to his lips.

  “Don’t die. Please don’t die.” I kissed him again. If only I could breathe life into his lungs. “Don’t die. Not now. Not when you have so much to live for.” I kissed his lips, salty tears mingling with a taste I would never forget. “Not when I love you.”

  Sharp pain zapped my palms.

  I pulled back.

  Another zap, shooting up my arms as if I’d touched electric wire.

  I dropped his hands.

  He gasped.

  I scrambled backwards as his body arched up on heels and head, suspending his torso clear off the floor like some frigging supernatural possession shit.

  Fuck!

  He collapsed on another gasp. A dry, desperate, oxygen-starved drag for air.

  I crawled back, grabbing his hands once more. Warm. Yielding.

  His eyes shot open. Beautiful twin forests that latched onto mine.

  My heart stuttered. “Gideon!”

  His lips parted and I kissed them, so warm, so alive.

  He kissed me back, his hands raking my hair, devouring me as if I were his life source.

  I wanted that so much.

  We broke for air and he pushed up. I straddled his hips and cupped his magnificent face. “I thought I’d lost you.”

  “I needed you to live.” He covered my hands and warmth flooded them.

  “Not without you.” I shook my head, tears spilling freely over my nose, my chin. “I was stupid.”

  “You were justified.”

  “I love you.”

  He grinned his glorious, heart-stopping grin. “That’s the best thing I’ve heard all day.”

  I kissed him then. With all my heart. With all my soul.

  I had my dream and nothing else mattered.

  A-hem.

  We broke free. Turned. Frenemy.

  “Damon.”

  Frenemy moved in then, when before he’d given us space. “That was one fucking A-rated display you put on, bro.”

  Gideon grinned again, and it was the most beautiful sight I’d ever seen. “It’s been an age since you called me that.”

  Frenemy rubbed his chin and grinned back. “It’s been an age since I was sure it wouldn’t trigger another crack to the jaw.”

  A look passed between them. A look that had to span centuries.

  Gideon swallowed. “Thanks, bro.”

  “Anytime.” Frenemy tilted his head towards the door. “Think we should let them in?”

  It was only then I heard the banging and bellowing of voices outside.

  I clambered off Gideon and Frenemy helped him up. The men hugged, backslapped, did all that macho man-bonding that men do, then Gideon took my hand and squeezed. “Ready?”

  I looked up into his face, beautiful and flushed red with the flow of life through his veins. “Always.”

  Then Frenemy opened the door.

  Chapter 38

  Tiffany

  “Best. Meal. Ever.” I dropped my fork onto my empty plate, not a speck remaining of the feast Gideon had painstakingly prepared for my welcome home—roasted lime chicken breast with a fresh salsa of cherry and avocado in a lime and olive oil dressing. I licked my oil-coated lips.

  His gaze tracked my tongue’s path, eyes darkening to brilliant, deep-ocean green—the glowing vampire gold forever relegated to the past.

  I loved his reaction. Loved that his hunger for me hadn’t waned with his newly found mortality. If anything, it had grown.

  I swirled the pale pink cider in my glass then sipped. A medley of apple, cranberry and basil tripped across my tongue. “I’ve been thinking.”

  His gorgeous lips dipped into the lethal slide of a grin. “A dangerous preoccupation.”

  I tipped my head. “Touché.”

  I returned my glass to the table and snagged a cherry and chunk of avocado from Gideon’s plate. “I think I’ve figured out how your mortal transformation occurred without The Prophesy’s whole love and essence combine scenario.”

  He dropped his elbows to the table and leaned in. “I’m all ears.”

  He was more than that, but for once I didn’t feel the need to avoid conversation or our connection with sex. This moment, talking and sharing, filled my soul in a way fucking never had. That didn’t mean sex was relegated to the shelf, only that it was sidelined. For now.

  “Surrender heart, body and soul. That’s sacrifice, right? You willingly sacrificed it all. Your mortality. For me. Maybe that’s how you were saved.”

  “Maybe.” He thoughtfully knocked back a mouthful of lager, contemplating the gold and black label as he swallowed. “It doesn’t explain one thing, though.”

  I sipped my wine, wracking my brains. We’d discussed Gideon’s change in detail on the way home, after, all through his preparation of dinner, agreeing that what had taken place back in the hospital made sense but for one salient factor—we’d never p
erformed the whole exchange essence and bite ritual. As it turned out, sacrifice trumped sex. But everything else added up, so… “What did we miss?”

  He grinned, eyes glinting. “How does Sammy fit into all of this?”

  Laughter burst from my lips, along with a generous serving of wine. I grabbed a napkin and mopped up my plate. “He’s an old friend.”

  “So, he’ll come out and play on occasion?” He discarded his lager and leaned in, bracing both hands either side of his plate. “As long as he knows where he stands in this relationship.”

  “Absolutely.” I reached across the table and wrapped my hand around his. I caught his gaze and butterfly flutters filled my chest. “I gave Sammy my body, but you’ll always have my heart.”

  He squeezed, stroking his beautiful lithe fingers along my knuckles and across the underside of my wrist. “Ditto.”

  Funny. I’d never believed it possible—this incredible, all-encompassing love for one man. The more I discovered, the deeper he burrowed into my heart—a thought that no longer made me want to run and hide. It just made me want to know more.

  I took another sip of wine. “Tell me about you and Frenemy.”

  “Frenemy?”

  I shot him a grin. “Your recently rediscovered buddy. Damon. You know. You were once friends, then enemies. Frenemies.”

  “O-kay.”

  “So, what’s the story?”

  “Not terribly interesting.” He sighed. “Boy meets girl. Boy trusts girl with coven secrets, thinking girl will save him from immortality. Girl screws boy then passes coven secrets onto their enemies. People die. Girl disappears. Coven leader is furious. Friendship is ruined. Boy is forever marred by his stupidity.”

  “Fuck. That totally sucks.”

  “Yeah, especially for those who lost their lives.”

  The cut, the deep hurt and guilt were ingrained in his expression, and my heart ached with his pain. “I get why you didn’t share your plan to switch the serum and save the world.”

  “If it’s any consolation, I felt like shit for keeping it from you.”

  I knew that now. Knew so many things that had eluded me in the midst of my post-Richard bleeding. Not only had Gideon unlocked my emotions, he’d opened my awareness. “What happened to her?”